kinginyellowfandomcom-20200213-history
The King In Yellow (The Play)
'The King In Yellow '''is the dread play at the heart of the stories that form the book of the same name by Robert W. Chambers. The Play The play is generally regarded as having been published in 1895, although some claim that it was written earlier and/or based on earlier works. According to the story The 7th Day The Yellow God Rests, the 1895 printing can be recognised by the golden salamander on its cover. It probably consists of two acts (see First Act and Second Act). Although it is sometimes thought to have been written in French, The Repairer of Reputations states that the play was translated into French, the French government seizing the translated copies that had just arrived in Paris (from where is not stated), after which there was great demand in London to read it. It should be noted that this happened in the alternate timeline of that story, rather than in the history we are used to. The story In Carcosa, The King has a character state that the last copy of the play in America was burnt by his grandmother at some point before 1990. The Author The author is never named by Chambers, although in ''The Repairer of Reputations ''it is suggested that the author shot himself after writing it, although Hildred Castaigne believes that he yet lives. Castaigne himself, or another of that name, has also been given as either the author of the play or the person who completed it because it was unfinished by the original author, although this does not appear to have been Chambers' vision. Common Interpretations The actual contents of the play are only hinted at by Chambers, but a common interpretation has emerged amongst some authors : The play concerns the final days of the dynasty of a distant world, the arrival of a Stranger to their city, a masked ball and the final disastrous arrival of The King In Yellow. Various authors have given us details of the play and it's background, and whilst most of them relate the same details, some seem to be inconsistent with each other. This page attempts to draw together some of the examples of text. All versions of the story introduce Carcosa as a mysterious city where the King rules (or is perhaps in exile). For more on the contents on the play as established by Chambers see The King In Yellow (Reconstructing The Play). Dramatis Personae The following ''Dramatic Personae are characters from the play, as elaborated from various sources. * Aldones * Camilla * Cassilda * Castellan * Naotalba * Thale * Uoht * The Child * The Stranger (The Phantom of Truth?) * The King In Yellow Note that only Camilla, Cassilda and The Stranger are actually stated by Chambers to be characters in the play. Confusion It's worth noting that only a few of the 'established' characters, Camilla, Cassilda and The Stranger, are mentioned by Chambers directly, in quoting from the play, although we can see that The King himself is also a prominant figure. Other names are vague references, to either people or places, and these details have been fleshed out by other writers. It appears that the main confusion seems to have been over the definition of who or what the name 'Yhtill' belongs to - and from here the play seems to have diverged into two seperate interpretations. Hastur is usually credited as the name of the city the play is set in, although August Derleth, in his Cthulhu Mythos stories made it the name of a Great Old One usually credited as being the entity of which The King In Yellow is an avatar. Yhtill is used, depending on the source, either as an alternative name for the central city or as the name of The Stranger (or rather it is the word for 'stranger' as used in the city of Alar). Alar is generally accepted as being a city mentioned in the play, a city that is at war with the central city, although on one count the name has been credited to a character. Irritatingly enough, the divergence seems to have been split into one setting usually followed by established authors, and one setting which has been carved out for the benefit of the games. As the latter continues to gain momentum as a defining element of the Carcosa Mythos, it grows increasingly important to see where the two unite, where they differ, and whether the differences demand two alternative settings or just one elusive whole. The King In Yellow appears, therefore, impossible to pin down as an exact text. Is this due to inconsistencies between the various authors (both those in the real world and in it's fictional counterpart), or might there be something else at work here? * See Theories - Are There Multiple Copies Of The Play? * See Theories - Does The Text Of The Play Reflect The Reality Of Carcosa? The Chambers Version of The Play Robert W. Chambers, in writing his book The King In Yellow, quotes only the briefest passages of the play, and then only from the first act, for example: "The very banality and innocence of the first act only allowed the blow to fall afterward with more awful effect". See The King In Yellow (Reconstructing The Play) for more details. Category:Eldritch Tomes